We Decked the Halls

Last year prior to Christmas, Kennedy kept commenting on all of our neighbors outdoor Christmas lights. When I say commenting, what I mean is she literally would not stop begging and pleading with us to put up outdoor lights. I mean, she would basically look at Tim and I as if we were the biggest fuddy duddy's on planet earth because we didn't have outdoor decoration. I guess the silver lining is she's nothing if not passionate, right?  I'll be honest - I'm not really an outdoor lights kinda gal. In high school my Dad got a wild hair to hang up outdoor lights and y'all - he hung up solid blue lights (the big fat bulb kind) all around our house trim. As if the solid blue (mind you we had absolutely no affiliation with UK then) lights weren't bad enough, my Mom tried to "church it up" (unsuccessfully so) by throwing in some white lights and garland on our outdoor railing and I think we had some pre-lit twiggy reindeer out front too. Yikes! I digress....

 

In an effort to please my daughter (it's flippin' amazing what our kids will cause us to do) I went out after Christmas last year and bought a boatload of outdoor decoration. I bought lights for the house and lights for the path and little gutter clippie thingies to hold the lights up and a nice canvas bag to store the lights in and yadda, yadda, yadda. All the decor was 75% off, but of course it was a tad picked over so it required me driving to several Lowes to get coordinating lights. As you can imagine I got no thanks from my then 4 year old. It's a thankless job sometimes..being a mom. Oh well.

 

The weekend after Thanksgiving we set to hanging our new lights! Greyson pretty much did this:

I probably shouldn't take any credit for the light hanging, especially since once in a blue moon my husband reads this blog. Tim did all the light hanging and I wrangled our kiddos. I won't say who I feel worked harder ;).

The girls ran around like wild women and it took all I had to keep them from getting jumbled up in cords and connections and the like. Here's a cute pic of our little sidewalk snowflakes.

Trying on Daddy's toboggan.

The girls loved the lights once they were all up and turned on. Every night Kennedy would get excited to turn on the lights and Avery would squeal once they came on. I laughed so hard when we turned them on for the first time. As it turns out, the lights I bought which were called "Light Show" brand were called that not because it was just the brand name...they actually put on a synchronized light pattern show and it was a bit much for my taste but what are you going to do a year later after you purchased them on clearance. I'll tell  you what you do - you just giggle and have fancy bedazzling lights on your house. Ha!

 

I was so proud of us for purchasing and putting up lights until about a week later we went to my friend Jennifer's house which she self-admittedly says is decorated  for redneck Christmas (read...tons of mismatched decorations and lights) and as we pull up Kennedy oooohhs and aaaahhhs and asks why we can't decorate like that. OH.MY.WORD! Oh you gotta love kiddos, they keep you humble and just when you think you've scored some major Mommy points - they remind you that there's always a little more you could have done. Sigh...

 

After hanging up our lights, we ventured out to get our tree. I love that our family has started the tradition of going out to pick out a real tree. Sadly, there were no local farms where we could cut our own tree or have our own tree cut...there were only places you could purchase a pre-cut tree. We went to a nearby farm and the person who grew the trees was there and he was incredibly kind and helpful and it was a nice little family outing.

 

We didn't pay extra for the hayride, but the girls loved the Clydesdale's.

Our tree!

Peppermint Path

Hot Chocolate in the covered wagon: yum!

Me and my boy. He says thanks for the camo Chels!

Kennedy was very involved and eager to help with the tree this year. Here she is helping her Daddy hang the lights. Avery basically climbed on and off of our decoration storage containers all night. Hey, whatever makes a girl happy - right?

Fun times!